Thursday, July 21, 2016

Some Things I’ve Learned Along the Way

Soon I’ll be seventy years
old. It’s hard to fathom this, since I
still feel twenty-five.

When I was young, I lived
for moments. Today, I’m living for time.
Langston Hughes has a poem that included the line, “life is short, but God is
long.” That’s how I feel these days.

My decades as a Christian
activist have taught me valuable lessons. I’ve had to learn a lot of these things the
hard way, but I boiled a handful of “lessons” down to twelve common sense and
overlapping principles of protest, some of which are adapted from my book Free At Last?— all of which are based on familiar biblical truths.

They’ve served me well at
different levels of cultural engagement, so I offer them as a reminder of our
true focus, the gracious God who has ‘shown us what is good.’I hope they can help us avoid the “syncretistic subculture” discussed in my last
blog, and save us unnecessary tears and wasted years as we seek to ‘do what the
Lord requires of us — namely “to act justly and to love mercy and to walk
humbly with...God” (Micah 6:8).

Many of you in the field will
already be familiar with these concepts, but there are also some men and women
I’ve spoken with who are just wading into the waters of protest and prayer,
even at this stage. If you don’t find
these principles helpful today, I hope they will be useful in the years to come.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned, there
will always be something in our immediate surroundings that will fall short of
God’s plan for a just society.

Everything we do
should hasten the day when “the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the
glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.” Therefore as we go, whether across the seas
or across the tracks; whether to teach or to preach; whether to pray or to
protest; etc., we should be making “disciples”
(Matthew 28:18-22) – those who are learning to
obey ‘all things that Christ commands.’
A disciple can be an individual or a culture, however a disciple is not
necessarily a convert. Yet the more Christ’s
commands are applied, the better the quality of life.

I saw most fruit in
the field when the young Christian activist was engaged in prophetic
discipleship — both to those we protest against, and to the protestors
themselves. These efforts will be
successful if, at the end of the protest, people on both sides of the
controversy have a greater consciousness of the glory of God. It makes no difference whether this
“consciousness” is embraced or suppressed.
The real issue will be exposed to the light of truth. I would go so far as to say the positive
effect of prophetic discipleship will even go beyond the remedy of the
grievance. This is transformative
protest.

In his speech that
set the tone of the Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955-56), Dr. Martin Luther King
pointed out that the significance of this protest had the potential to set a
positive precedence for years to come.

If you will protest
courageously, and yet with dignity and Christian love, when the history books
are written in future generations, the historians will have to pause and say,
“There lived a great people — a [Black] people — who injected new meaning and
dignity in the veins of civilization. This is our challenge and our
overwhelming responsibility.” *

Protest without
prophetic discipleship is non-transformative and empty. It may change the status quo, but if the
problems of flawed human nature are not diminished through transformation, they
will come back and bite us — often nullifying what the protest is trying to
accomplish. Perhaps we are where we are
today because hearts in my generation were merely legislated, yet not
transformed.

2) There is power in our transcendent reference point.

When the protest
goals are secondary to our prime directive of discipleship, we will make more
progress than when the protest goals are primary. A transcendent reference point multiplies the
effectiveness of the protest exponentially.
To use an analogy, my love for my wife is second to my love for God;
because my love for God is first, she gets much more love from me than if she
was first. Such is the quality and
nature of God’s love that I receive.

In my early days, I learned
that it was difficult to fully exercise the prime directive underthe
leadership of those who leave out the most important purpose of the protest –
the glory of God.

Our transcendent reference point is the basis of our wisdom (Proverbs 9:10).
It is our redemptive God-given contribution to the cause for which we
protest. Without this unique
contribution, our voice merely becomes another run-of-the-mill addition to the
cacophony, contributing to today’s cultural confusion.

We can be
“co-belligerents” with groups with a non-transcendent reference point, but it’s
difficult to be allies. Non-transcendent
ideologies are simply not radical enough for the Christian activist. The Christian activist is looking for
transformation of society, its systems, and individual hearts. For us, there’s nothing more radical than
transformation.

3) Seek the moral high ground.

Jesus demonstrated
this and we should follow suit. He did
not ‘judge by what he saw with his eyes, or decide by what he heard with his
ears’ he judged “with righteousness...” (Isaiah 11:3b-4a). In other words, hear-say or first appearance
are not reliable sources of information on which to base a protest.

The Christian
activist, if he or she is consistent, will take the time to ascertain and sort
out the facts. The Christian voice may
not be the first heard, but will be the strongest voice heard — a prophetic
voice.

We live in a universe created and lorded over by the infinite personal Creator whose moral principles will always be fulfilled. Thus, the more we align with His moral principles, the more power we will have in addressing the wrongs against which we protest.Without moral clarity, the point of the protest becomes bogged down, clouded and confused.

4) Seek Kingdom righteousness in your protest.

The more righteous
the protest, the more powerful the
protest. The only basis for judging
between good and evil is the character of God.
That which conforms to God’s character is right, and that which goes
against his character is wrong.
Important aspects of right and wrong are righteousness and
unrighteousness.

Righteousness is a
relational term. It simply means “doing
right by the other party in the relationship.”
Two expressions of righteousness are a) piety,
doing right by God in a narrow sense — involving devotion and ceremony,
and b) justice, doing right by fellow human
beings.

For the victims of
injustice or oppression, justice has two basic applications a) liberation from
oppression, and b) empowerment to do the right thing. For the perpetrators of injustice and
oppression, justice involves the swift and compassionate application of the
legal consequences of their actions and omissions.

For the Christian activist, justice for the oppressed must be pursued and visualized through the lens of righteousness.

5) Avoid ad-hominem arguments.

In
today’s emotionally charged cultural context, ad-hominem attacks are common. They are aimed at destroying the person who
holds the views we oppose, rather than dismantling the views themselves. This is violence. Ad-hominem attacks distract us from the real
issues, and lay the groundwork for our protest to be interpreted by others with
counter intentions. In the end, we may
end up with a new tyranny as bad or worse than the injustice we protest
against.

We
all want to be treated with dignity, compassion and respect. It was all too easy back in ‘the day’ to see
the provocateurs of the protest as a dehumanized enemy. In the heat of many tense moments, we had to
constantly remind ourselves, not only do our opponents bear God’s image just
like us, but they are sinners in need of grace — just like us. By failing to act on this truth, or by
engaging in ad-hominem violence, or by not calling it sin when we see it occur
around us, we forfeit the moral high ground.

Yes,
be angry if you must. But focus that
anger primarily on the grievance itself, not necessarily on the people behind
the grievance.

6) Avoid being provocative beyond the offence of the grievance itself.

Let the grievance do
the speaking for you. When we embellish
the grievance with unnecessary provocation, it clouds the issue and is
counterproductive. The cause of justice
does not need the help of evils such as hatred and falsehood. Anger?
Yes, but anger without sin (Ephesians 4:26). The less anger is accompanied by evil, the
more efficacious will be the anger. The
more anger is accompanied by love, the more efficacious will be the anger.

So, speak the
truth in love, demonstrate the truth in love, dramatize the truth
in love, chant the truth in love, SHOUT the truth in love,
etc. In other words, be forceful, but do
it in love — a powerful weapon indeed.

7) Let the Word of God do the heavy lifting.

The Word of God can
be spoken without giving its chapter and verse, yet it has the same power
either way. The Word is still the Word
whether it is quoted directly, paraphrased, dramatized, expressed in narratives,
articulated in ‘spoken word,’ rhymed in ‘hip hop,’ chanted in slogans,
etc. Too many times the Christian
community has been so uncreative with the Word that we fail to communicate it —
often giving the impression that the Word is a set of tired and powerless clichés.

We have yet to tap
into the wisdom and power available to us in the Word. The Word of God is the power that created
this universe (John 1:1-3) — a reality so vast
that we don’t know where it ends. The
same “Word” also sustains the universe (Hebrews 1:3). That being the case, it should not surprise
us that the “Word” will ‘accomplish what it desires and achieve the purpose for
which it was sent.’ “It will not return...empty” (Isaiah 55:11).

When the Word is
rightly and creatively applied to the art of protest, its effect will be tangible.

8) Justice does not equal revenge.

Many cite an “eye for
an eye” and a “tooth for tooth” (Deuteronomy 19:21)
as a justification for revenge. On the
contrary, this is a “lex talionis” — a law of limitation. In other words, “no more than an eye for an
eye, no more than a tooth for tooth.”

The wise Christian
activist helps his or her co-belligerents take a stand of ‘non-vengeance’ —
leaving the vengeance to God because he or she knows that God can and will do a
far better job of revenge than we can imagine.

On the other hand, many
cite Jesus words to “turn the other cheek” (Matthew 5:39) as a call to be punks.
This twisted interpretation has contributed to the toxic perceptions of
Christianity among our urban youth. On
the contrary, “turn the other cheek” is a statement of ‘non-vengeance.” It is also a call to respond to an enemy in a
way he least expects. Therefore, if your
enemy expects you to be mean, then be kind.
On the other hand, if your enemy expects you to be a punk, then be
aggressive.

Never let the one
against whom you are protesting put you in a box; when he tries, bust it
open. As Christ’s ambassadors, we are
called to be diplomats — not door-mats.

9) Words have different meanings to different communities.

When we define the
points of agreement with our co-belligerents, we must make sure that our shared
words have the same meaning. When that
is impossible, we must make sure that we understand what they mean and they
understand what we mean. On that basis,
we can make intelligent decisions whether or not, or how to cooperate.

The more our
co-belligerents understand how our words and concepts fit into our worldview,
the more they will understand our transcendent perspective. This will contribute to our discipleship
agenda.

On the other hand,
for the protest to have its desired effect, we must learn the language of our
opponents. Communication is a key to
protest, not just words. In our slogans,
chants, rally cries, etc., it is wise to choose words that our opponents
understand that will confront them with the truth — leaving them without the
option of ignoring the issue at hand and the Ultimate Source of the truth we
communicate. This too will contribute to
our discipleship agenda.

10) Let the true narrative of the grievance be self-evident.

Integrity is key for
the Christian activist, so there’s no need to “juke” (manipulate) a narrative
to make our point. Manipulating the
narratives might seem to give the protest a short term advantage but it will
ultimately undercut it, causing it to lose its power. As a protest loses moral power, the easier it
is for the opponent to explain it away as mere agitation or dismiss it as a
nuisance.

Because our opponents
bear God’s image and live in God’s world, they have a God-given sense of good
and evil, and justice and injustice (Romans 2:14-16). No matter how hard they try, they will never
succeed in ‘suppressing’ this truth (Romans 1:18-20). The power is in the truth, not in
deception.; admit and affirm truth, even when it’s hard.

11) Tranquility does not equal peace.

I
have observed that many in the dominant culture confuse these two. However, an unjust tranquility is an unstable
and volatile sham that needs to be disrupted and demolished. This is why we protest.

True
peace is more than tranquility; it is a state of being that leads to God’s
original plan for human flourishing.

This
is what we point to as the goal of our protest.

12) Our involvement in protest must have a redemptive and transformative role.

Since the role of the
Christian activist is to speak prophetically to all sides in the controversy, important
questions need to be answered. How is
the controversy framed? What is the aim
of the protest? Is it advocating a
solution or is it fomenting unrest for other purposes?

As a young activist,
I had to learn the hard way that what counts is
the net prophetic message — prophetic credits (resulting from the wise
things we do) minus prophetic debits
(resulting from the foolish things we do). Our prophetic messages will never match the
caliber of biblical messages. After all,
the Bible is “God breathed.” This is revelation. The key for Christian activists is to be
biblical by maximizing our prophetic credits, and minimizing prophetic
debits. The net message will be illumination.

Distinctions must be
made when we invoke a rally cry framed by unbiblical parameters. On the other hand, if a protest organization has
a valid rally cry but is inconsistent in applying it, we must lovingly critique
this inconsistency. If we fail to do so
we release more unwanted prophetic debits, and blunt the impact of the protest.

In summary, implementing
these principles will amplify the power of protest to change the unjust status
quo and maximize the quality of the resulting change. However, there is no guarantee that our opponents
or our non-Christian co-belligerents will receive our transcendent message;
that’s up to God. However, we will have
fulfilled our prime directive, society will be better off, and God will be
glorified.

Final Observations

I recognize that just like
the great creeds and confessions were not first drafts, we can’t expect to get
our theological formulations and practices perfect on first blush. We need to find our way together. This is a process that will take time, sweat,
love and patience. I’m open to talking
about these principles, and having them adjusted for today’s application. Even as I approach seventy, I’m still
learning.

If we continue to pursue
this together, the entire church — both in the dominant culture and the
subdominant culture — will benefit from a theology of protest we can apply to
any and all issues, not just those of today.

If you can think of
further biblical lessons beyond these twelve, feel free to add them in the
comment section.

5 comments:

Such helpful thinking and theologizing. I would also be helped if specific examples were given to illustrate your points. For examples, what are some of the words that have different meanings (#9), or what are some of the ad-hominem arguments used (#5)?

Carl,I only have two points to make here. First, you are chronological pioneer for me and I don't feel like I am 25. How do you do it?

Second, when I became involved in activism, I became determined to let my activism revolve around the parable of the 2 men praying. What follows is that I could either protest as the pharisee or I could protest as the publican. The difference is that as the pharisee, I would call for a swift and harsh judgment on all who commit injustices. As the latter one, I not only seek relief for the oppressed, I seek the repentance of and reconciliation for a peer. Thus, I try to call the oppressor to change in the same way that I want others to call me to change.

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